The dollar has weakened against all of its major competitors on Friday, following the release of the weaker than expected new home sales report. The U.S. currency had been staging a comeback over the past few sessions from a bout of recent weakness.
New home sales in the U.S. fell by much more than anticipated in the month of July, according to a report released by the Commerce Department on Friday, which also showed a substantial downward revision to the data for June.
The report said new home sales tumbled 13.4 percent to an annual rate of 394,000 in July from the revised June rate of 455,000. Economists had been expecting new home sales to edge down to an annual rate of 487,000 from the 497,000 originally reported for the previous month.
The European Central Bank said on Friday that banks that participated in the long-term refinancing operations will repay EUR 305 million next week. This was the lowest amount since banks started paying back early this year. Banks started early repayment of the first LTRO loans in January with the initial amount of EUR 137.2 billion.
The recent "stream of good news" from Eurozone reduced the need for further interest rate reduction, European Central Bank's Ewald Nowotny said in an interview with the Bloomberg news agency.
"I would not see many arguments now for a rate cut," Nowotny, who heads Austria's central bank, said. But the most recent developments will not have any immediate effects on the policy of the ECB.
Nowotny said he is "cautiously optimistic" about the economic outlook. The Eurozone recovery is weak, he noted.
The dollar had been hovering around the $1.3350 level against the Euro early Friday, but has since dropped to around $1.3390.
Germany confirmed its robust recovery during the second quarter, with domestic spending and investment boosting growth to the fastest pace since the start of 2012.
The economy expanded as initially estimated by 0.7 percent in the second quarter from the previous three-month period, detailed results published by Destatis showed Friday. This was the biggest increase since the first quarter of 2012.
The greenback had climbed to an early high of $1.5538 against the pound sterling Friday, but has since pulled back to around $1.5575.
The rebound in exports and strong investment helped the U.K. economy to expand at a faster-than-initially-estimated pace in the second quarter.
The economy expanded 0.7 percent sequentially in the second quarter, the Office for National Statistics said Friday. The rate exceeded the initial estimate of 0.6 percent and the first quarter's 0.3 percent expansion.
The numbers mortgages approved for house purchases in the United Kingdom decreased modestly in July, ending the upward trend seen since the turn of the year, the British Bankers' Association (BBA) said Friday. The outcome defied economists' forecast for a further increase.
Mortgage approvals for purchase of residential properties decreased moderately to 37,200 in July from 37,337 in the previous month. Economists had forecast the number to rise to 39,400. Re-mortgage, meanwhile, increased slightly to 21,415 from 20,700 a month ago.
The buck climbed to over a 2-week high of Y99.139 early Friday, but has since retreated to around Y98.565.
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Forex News
May 22, 2026 14:46 ET Minutes of the latest Fed policy session was the highlight of the week along with survey data on the U.S. housing market. In Europe, survey data signaled the trends in the euro area private sector. Further, consumer price inflation data from the U.K. was in focus. In Asia, various economic indicators from China drew attention to the health of the economy.